Out of Time
by All you need is Loki
Summary: The Avengers are sent back in time by accident and arrive on Asgard. They meet a mischievous pair: ten year old Thor and eight year old Loki. None of them were expecting this strange adventure. Mostly Humour
1. Chapter 1

Chapter One: Tesseract, Tony, and Energy Drinks

Few times in the course of one's life does one turn to moments of near insanity. This may be in the sheer moments before ones wedding vows, after receiving a 49% on a mandatory-successful-completion class, or when the occupant of the seat behind you on the bus is having the world's loudest telephone conversation. In the case of Tony Stark, it was neither. It was at that moment, when the millionaire playboy genius raised the tesseract above his head and hurled it against an innocent by-standing wall while uttering a war-like cry. Instead of crashing to the ground in a million pieces, as we can only guess was the intent, a cold blue light shot out from the cube spreading wider as a hole opened up in time and space and a split second later all five of the present superheroes where sucked through it.

Lets rewind a bit.

Tony Stark sat at his desk staring reproachfully at the once- glowing cube in front of him. Dr. Bruce Banner sat in a chair across from him with a similar expression. They had been sitting much the same way for a good hour or so with little progress in it for obvious reasons.

"Well, maybe it needs some sort of kick start—like a power boost." Bruce offered with a shrug.

"We've been testing this thing for weeks now and we've given it everything we've got. There's no reason why it should have shut down like that. It's impossible!"

"I know but—"

Whatever Banner was about to say, helpful or not was cut off when the door opened suddenly and the super soldier, Captain America strode in.

"Security breach!" Tony yelped. "It's a Capsicle!" The soldier didn't seem to notice.

"Stark, Banner," he offered, nodding to each respectively, "bad news. Thor wants the Tesseract back—like now. He's coming here soon to pick it up. I don't think he trusts us with it—not that he should anyway" He gave the blue cube a quick glance and suppressed a shiver. Working or not working, there was something unnerving about that blue block of whatever it was, like an explosion waiting to happen. "Any luck with it so far?" the answer was fairly obvious.

"I don't understand it" Tony said sulkily, all humor gone. "Maybe if I have more time I could get it going again, I just need—"

"Tony, come on, you've been working on this for five days straight. You need a rest!" Steve's eyes swept around the lab. Honestly, the place looked like a tornado had crashed through it. Empty cans of energy drinks, papers, wires, books, and various unidentifiable tools were scattered everywhere. Where the garbage had once been was a mound of crumpled up paper ten feet high. After that had been covered beyond recognition, the millionaire or what seemed now to be a mad scientist, had given up and used the general floor area instead.

"I've been telling that to him for days and he still won't listen to me." Bruce grumbled.

"I told you!" Tony said irritated jumping up from his seat, "I'll break when I'm done! And I will get it done! Even if it kills me!" but as soon as he was up, he appeared to have a hard time staying there. His legs began shaking from mix of severe exhaustion and an alarming number of energy drinks. The genius seemed to find it amusing and broke out into an insane sounding laughter.

"Whoa there Frankenstein," Steve muttered, helping the delirious man back to his chair.

Dr. Banner sighed exasperated, with his palm in his face, "Here he goes again. Not the creepy laughter. Tony, as your friend, and a doctor, I'm telling you—get some rest!"

"Never!" he shrieked like a five year old protesting against his bedtime hour, threw a nearby tissue box in the general direction of the offender, while he continued laughing hysterically.

That was when agent Clint Barton walked in with agent Natasha Romanoff. He was promptly greeted at the door with a tissue box in the face.

"Okay, how long has he been in here this time?" he snarled, ready to sling the box back with vengeance.

The millionaire seemed unfazed by this new threat, "I'm never ever ever going to leave! Mwahahahaha!"

"Tony, listen to me," Natasha said in a motherly voice, "It's not nice to throw tissue boxes. Apologise to Agent Barton." Slowly, carefully, she edged her way towards the crazed man's desk.

Tony stared at her blankly for a few seconds before responding, "Who are you?"

"Oh. That long, huh?" Clint inched closer towards the exit.

Before the Black Widow reached the desk, Tony grabbed a previously neutral eraser and threw it wildly towards her. It missed, however, but the damage was done.

"Okay, the genius gets it!" she cried, grabbing the tissue box from Clint and preparing to drive it straight at him. Thankfully for Tony, Steve managed to pry if from her before she reached her goal.

"Look everyone, we need to behave like reasonable adults here, alright? Thor will be here any minute to collect the tesseract and bring it back to Asgard. I want everyone to be behaving responsibly." he gave a pointed glare at Tony who stuck out his tongue.

D. Banner stood up, brushing off his spotless shirt. "Well I guess I'll take the tesseract to my lab, two rooms down. It's cleaner—well obviously—anyway, Tony, sorry buddy, it's coming with me." But Tony looked like he wasn't about to comply with this.

"What do you mean it's coming with you? I'm not done with it yet!"

"Tony, look, it belongs with Thor—"

"It belongs with me!" Tony was hugging the cube like a blanket, refusing to let go.

"No, no, no, no," Banner tried fruitlessly to retrieve the tesseract from his tight grip, "It's—coming—with—me—now!" he huffed. Finally after much tugging and pulling, he gave up and sank back into his chair. "and I thought Loki was crazy!"

"If I don't get it nobody gets it!" Tony hollered.

If Dr. Banner, or any of the avengers had known what was to happen next, they would have been on top of Tony in an instant but as they did not, nothing could have prepared them for what happened next. It was at that moment, when the millionaire playboy genius raised the tesseract above his head and hurled it against an innocent by-standing wall while uttering a war-like cry. Instead of crashing to the ground in a million pieces, as we can only guess was the intent, a cold blue light shot out from the cube spreading wider as a hole opened up in time and space and a split second later all five of the present superheroes where sucked through it.


	2. Chapter: Two

Chapter Two: The Beginning of the Beginning

There was a blinding light. It shone brighter and brighter till nothing was visible. The ground below their feet seemed to be spinning wildly. A chilling wind swept around them violently, threatening to throw them off balance. Then suddenly everything was still. Very still. Slowly colour, forms, and feelings began to seep back into the world, but it was not the same world they had previously occupied. Rather than giving light to an unkempt lab at SHIELD operations, they were standing atop a rich forest overlooking a city unlike anything they had ever seen. The bridges and buildings appeared to be millions of years old and yet made out of strange metal like material in perfect condition. At the heart of the city a golden castle towered proudly over the foreign landscape, the very image of power.

"Oh, My-" Clint started, his mind failing to come up with an explanation of what just happened. "What the hell? What the hell did that thing just do? Where on earth are we?"

"I don't think we're _on_ Earth." Natasha murmured, spinning slowly in a full circle to see every detail of her surroundings.

Bruce was speechless and remained gawking dumbfounded at what lay around him, and then quickly sat down to avoid falling on his face.

Tony was lying unconscious in the grass, murmuring something otherwise unintelligible but what sounded like a one sided debate over the existence of unicorns.

"Where is the tesseract?" Steve, always the first to take charge, began searching the grass for the cube that had dragged them there in the first place. "Everyone, start looking, we need it to get us back."

Clint and Natasha quickly joined in while Tony remained mumbling to himself about daisies and spats on the ground and Dr. Banner sat staring at nothing with a blank expression. So, the three of them spread out in search of it, scavenging through overgrown grass and bushes. But despite their efforts, the tesseract didn't turn up, and what seemed like hours later, they were ready to give in.

"Well? What now?" Natasha asked, joining Clint and Steve where they had started out, "If we don't have the tesseract to get back, we might as well find out where we are."

"Sounds like a plan," Steve agreed, glancing at Tony who was now sleeping soundly, "I almost don't want to wake him up. Almost."

Banner, who had finally recovered from his shock, peered into the deeper edge of the forest, "Do you hear something? Almost like-"

"Footsteps!" Clint completed, "Well at least we know there are people here."

"Running footsteps," Natasha corrected. "And they're coming towards us."

"Whoever they are, I hope they're friendly." Steve searched his pockets for some form of a weapon. Unfortunately, none of them were armed. This could end very badly on their part. As the racing footsteps came nearer and near, he Avengers prepared for the worst. They did not prepare for a young blond boy, no older than ten to come bounding into the clearing, or another, dark haired boy to follow swiftly behind. Both of them looked startled to see them there.

"Oh, no." groaned the first one. "You're not with the guards are you? Did father send you?"

"Don't be ridiculous brother, if they were with them, they wouldn't be dressed like that." Said the other calmly.

"No, you're right," Steve jumped in, "we're travellers and I'm afraid we've lost our way. Would you might telling us were we are?" he asked hopefully.

"Why, Asgard of course!" the blond boy stated proudly, "The mightiest of all the realms!" He frowned as he glanced around at the confused faces. "and I am The Mighty Thor! And this is my brother Loki."

The avengers yelped and took a jump back. The younger boy smiled, "Why is that so surprising? Have you really never been to Asgard before? I don't blame you, it's rather boring here."

"You're joking right?" Banner laughed nervously, "This is a dream, I know it's a dream, it has to be dream, so why is it not a dream?!"

"No, it really is very boring." Thor confirmed, "It's no wonder we keep getting in trouble." Bruce didn't bother to point out that was not what he meant.

"Honestly," Loki added, "One would think fun was off limits! A harmless prank hardly goes unnoticed-or unpunished for that matter."

"Well you did flood the castle."

"Harmless." Loki repeated, "Anyway, You know I don't eat fish. It's like rubber on a plate!"

"Why didn't you use your magic and just make it disappear?"

"She might have thought I really liked it and given me more."

"You don't know that!"

"When it comes to Mildred's cooking I don't take chances."

"I'm sorry, what happened?" Steve and probably everyone else, was utterly lost in the two boy's conversation.

"Loki doesn't like fish, so he set his lunch in flames and then tried to put it out with magic but accidently flooded the castle instead." How Thor managed to say all this like it was completely normal was beyond him.

"So now the guards are after us, and we'd rather not be caught, so here we are!" Loki chimed in. "We don't really enjoy being grounded-again."

"We should keep moving, brother," the miniature Thor started, "the guards will catch up with us any moment." He was right; the sound of running footsteps and clattering metal could be heard now. The Avengers had been through enough battles to recognise that was not a welcoming sound. However long those guards had been searching for the two runaway princes, they could not say, but the harsh pounding footstep indicated it had been a long long time, and now they were finally getting close.

"Wait!" Said Clint, "where are you going?"

"Away from here?" Loki shrugged like that was blatantly obvious. "Unless you want to get caught I suggest you do to."

"They're not planning on arresting us, are they?" Banner shifted nervously, "I kinda have a slight dislike towards dungeons, I know, I'm weird that way."

"Trespassing into the Allmother's private forest?" Thor laughed, "My friends, I doubt they let travellers pass through whenever they wish."

"Oh." Steve winced.

"Woops." Said Natasha.

"Shoot." Said Clint.

"Weeeell, okay, but that technically wasn't our fault." Bruce pointed out (un)helpfully.

Tony, who had been previously catching up on three days of sleep, sat bolt upright hollering, "SANTA!" he glanced around at the people around him. His eyes fell on Thor and Loki. "Oh, my, holy Aunt Jemima. That's-That's- I'm still dreaming, okay, just tell me I'm still dreaming."

"Why is your strange faced comrade staring at us, friend?" Thor whispered to Natasha, taking a step back.

"Maybe he is captivated by your intelligence." Loki offered

"oh." nodded Thor, not even acknowledging the sarcasm in his brother's voice.

"Um, Steve, this is, uh, Thor and Loki. The tesseract sent us to Asgard." Natasha shrugged, in a way that said, 'I don't know, don't ask me!'

"The tesseract?" Loki asked, confused, "The tesseract is here. On Asgard, with us."

Suddenly all eyes were pointed at him.

"We must keep moving Thor said anxiously, "The guards will stop at nothing to return us home"

"And then Father will have our heads! He still hasn't forgiven us for the time we glued his helmet and spear to the ceiling." Loki added, already grabbing Thor's wrist and pulling him along, "follow if you must, the guards will be far harsher with you than us."

The Avengers looked at each other for a moment and then took off into the forest following the two brothers.

"This has got to be the weirdest day of my life." Steve murmured, and then said, "Oh, wait, never mind…" Nobody bothered to inquire on when and how.

"Perhaps we should have taken less time talking and more time running!" Thor suggested.

"Plenty of time to converse later." Loki put in.

The Avengers were racing behind them, too busy being confused out of their minds to bother answering.

"We should hide somewhere," Thor said to Loki, as the running footsteps of palace guards and clamoring of armour sounded even louder than before.

"Where are we going to hide five fully grown strangers? It's not possible!"

"Then why did we go for the forest in the first place, if not to hide ourselves? Your brilliant plan, not mine!"

"I didn't know we would be dragging a whole army of tourists along with us did I?" Loki hissed. And he was right of course; the Avengers did look like a group of tourist right then. They were dresses in casual Midgardian wear while the Asgardian princes decked out in Royal New-and-improved Viking-like attire.

"What now then? We can disguise ourselves as the Allmother's gardeners and sneak out of here unnoticed."

"Um, no. Sorry Thor but sanity votes no. Where on Asgard are you planning on finding a disguise? Full points for creativity though."

"I don't know! You're the smart one, you think of something!" Thor scoffed.

"Dangerous words," Loki laughed, green eyes sparked with mischief.

Anyone who knew that look meant would either shrink back slowly, or turn and run screaming. Seeing as the guards were not yet present, no one can really blame them for not doing the same.

5


	3. Chapter 3

Chapter Three:

"Um, Loki?" Thor asked worriedly catching the look of fully determined mischief, "what are you planning to do?"  
"Oh, nothing... much"

Thor didn't ask. Sometimes it was better not to know. Easier just to wait for the chaos to unfold.  
"Right, well, try not to kill anyone." He offered instead.  
"Hey-that was just the one time!"  
"Wait-what?!" Thor whirled around to see if he was serious.  
"Got you." Loki laughed. Thor took a moment to get the joke and then joined in. The Avengers just looked at each other and shrugged. Yes, it was better not to question.

"Too the river!" Loki hollered happily taking a sharp turn around a thorny rosebush. Thor was less quick when he tried to doge the plant, since he was previously looking at his brother and didn't see the rather obvious bush as it came up to greet him. Instead he plowed ungracefully through it.

"Brother!" Thor winced pulling thorn after thorn out of his long red cape.  
Loki tried not to laugh at this and - failing- miserably- continued to run. "This way, quickly!"

The Avengers skirted around the rose bush warily.

Banner looked like he was going to collapse from exhaustion, "How can these kids have so much energy? I'm-so-incredibly-tired. Oh, and you know what that means, right?"

"Oh no," Natasha groaned, "Really? , now is really not the time!"

"You know I can't stop it!" Banner's heart speed was one of the last things on anyone's mind before that moment. Until it was too late, and by then of course, it was on each and every one of their minds and at that point, panic ensued.

"Bruce, you have to fight it. Bruce?" Steve was hardly one to panic. Sure, he panicked when the GPS he bought mislead him to the next state over and not the supermarket. Sure, he panicked when he found out nobody knew Bing Crosby or Bob Hope, but when it came to jumping out of airplanes parachute-less, or fighting ten against one in closed elevators, he was as calm as his yoga instructor. Maybe it was the confusion of being sent back in time on Asgard and escaping from guards while following a miniature Thor and Loki, or maybe it was just his age getting to him, but he felt scared and unsure. He cast the idea away of falling to his knees and begging them to go on without him, and decided to just go with the weirdness best he could manage.

Banner was changing now, faster than anyone would like. Green shot up his body like moss growing up a tree except much much faster and far more threatening-like.

"Oh, shoot." Tony managed to say before the Green Rage monster roared into existence. The Princes spun around, running backwards, to see this surprising new development of their friend.

"Brother! Get behind me! It's a green, horn-less Bilgesnipe!" Thor cried, gallantly drawing his hammer and rushing towards the Hulk, "How dare you attack us, foe? Retreat, or feel the weight of my hammer!"

"Don't be ridiculous, Brother, it's clearly a stress- induced giant of some form." Loki half guided, half pulled the still fuming Thor away from it while still swinging uselessly at it, and finally resorted to crying out petty insults. "And if you haven't noticed, it's not attacking, so you can put that down."

"Is it just me or was that kid _way_ too eager to kill Banner just then?" Tony was kind of thrown off by how much Thor loved waving his hammer around.

"It's okay, guys, really, he's friendly." Clint explained mostly to Thor, "Banner just does that sometimes, you know- he has some serious health issues" he gave a shrug that said 'Give the guy a break'

"Hulk friend." The green giant agreed smashing his fist on the ground with a resounding thud to make his point, which might not have made his point exactly but did make him heard.

After a brief moment of thought, and a sharp jab in the should from Loki, Thor apologised for trying to run him through with his hammer and insisted the giant accept his cape as a peace offering which was slightly torn up after it's encounter with the rosebush but Thor assured him it was crafted from Asgard's finest threads. The Hulk accepted the gift and draped the red cape, which really did nothing for his green complexion, half-heartedly over one giant shoulder because it didn't fit anywhere else.

The group already broke back into a run by this time, weaving through the forest, hopefully in the general direction of the river, with a new found speed and determination.

"Are you sure you know where we're going?" Natasha asked uncertainly, "I'm sure we've been through this part already."

Steve glanced at a large rose bush flattened in a perfect line where someone very heavy had barrelled through it. "Loki? Thor? We're going in circles."

"That kinda sucks," Clint murmured quietly.

"Of course we're going in circles!" the younger boy answered, "How else were we going to throw off the guards?"

"That's actually a really good point." Tony responded. He liked the way this kid thinks, "When were you planning on telling us?" Natasha questioned.

"I just thought it rather obvious if I said, 'We're going round in circles'. After all we've passed that rose bush twenty times by now. I assumed everyone would notice passing a rosebush the size of a horse with a Thor sized bite taken out of it."

"That's a really good point as well" Tony said again, with less enthusiasm.

"Did you not notice the guards are farther away?"

"We were just following you." Clint explained, then realised how stupid he made them all sound. "We're unfamiliar with these parts." He tried again. Then silently told himself to shut up.

Natasha cringed, "Let's just keep going and forget about this, okay?" Everyone seemed to agree, and they began pushing forward again, until Thor, who was walking as he always was, next to Loki, turned to him and said, "Wait-We're going in circles?"

Everyone groaned at that point and Thor took it as a hint to stop talking but on his face remained a look of utter confusion.

"I think we should go find that river right about now." Loki concluded glaring at Thor who responded with,

"You know, that's a very good idea, we shall do that. Let's follow that trail!" he started ahead to take the lead.

"What trail?" Loki asked unimpressed, standing where he was.

"The trail that we blaze!" Thor answered, with his head held high, still walking.

"You're going the wrong way."

Thor stopped in his tracks. Then turning around, he began jogging in the opposite direction, back to his brother saying sheepishly, "Um- maybe you should lead for now."

Loki lifted a slender eyebrow.

"Please?" Thor offered, giant blue, sad, puppy dog eyes looking like liquid innocence.

"Fine. We follow _that_ trail." Everyone's eyes followed his pointed finger at the opposite direction of Thor choice of a path.

Soon everyone was moving quickly again, and in no time they were travelling at a healthy pace with the scent of the river rising to meet them. As it happened, it was a rather wide river, and there were no boats that they could see along the rocky shore. When they reached the clearing of sand and rocks, they took a moment to sit for a break seeing as the sound of the guards thumping footsteps were now far behind them.

The Hulk shrunk back into the form of Dr. Banner and he used Thor's cape as a shirt, borrowing one of Loki's throwing knives (what kid conceals throwing knives in the folds of his garments?) to cut out a hole for his head to fit through. All in all, it was a very creative looking poncho, not to mention very red and full of holes and, well-a poncho. The rest of the avengers took off their shoes and began cooling off in the icy cold water.

"So," Thor started resting on the warm sand with both feet in the water, "How do we get across? Think we can swim? I'm a pretty good swimmer, I bet I could make it to the other side."

"Swimming? But that's so boring and unimaginative!" Loki was resting against a tree, taking in the cool shade, "Too bad it's so hot out."

"Then make it cold." Thor yawned tiredly, closing his eyes.

Loki sat up straight, his shrewd green eyes becoming sharper, "You know, that's the brightest idea you've had all day." He waited for Thor to bask in that compliment till he turned to him and realised the big muscular blond of a brother had fallen asleep there.

Getting up and walking closer to the lake he looked down thoughtfully at the still water. The Avengers had long since abandoned it. Natasha and Clint were chatting together holding hands on a large rock, Steve was making a sand castle, of sorts, while Tony was making an impression of Stark Towers out of sand, and Bruce was attempting (and failing) to skip stones on the flat surface of the lake.

Using his magic, Loki cast out a green coloured mist that covered the entire lake, when it cleared, the lake was-different.

The Avengers looked up, and made their way over with jaws dropped.

"Holy Odin's eyepatch!" Thor yelled waking up to the light touch of snowflakes falling on his face. Snow was falling gently out of the August sky, against the once warm sand and the now frozen lake.

"Everyone, lace up your shoes, and follow me." Loki ordered, pointing to the pile of discarded shoes that each had a slender blade running underneath the sole.

The Avengers looked at each other. They were all thinking the same thing. Skates. Heck yeah. Ten minutes later, everyone was laced in their new skates, and teetering around on the smooth ice. Thor slowly made his way over to Loki cautiously, like he would topple over with one wrong move, which he had his fair share of experience with when he first got onto the ice. Bending forward at the knees with both hands spread out to balance himself, while his whole body shook at the effort, he looked like a blinded tightrope walker. Steve and Tony were pretty good, and so was Natasha. Clint was a little rusty but he had Natasha to guide him around by the hand which kept him from falling on his face.

"Steady there, Barton," she laughed, as he nearly stumbled over his own feet.

Dr. Banner was less lucky. Oddly enough his nose managed to survive its violent greeting to the frozen ice ground with little loss of blood considering its brutal bashing. He assured everyone who witnessed his graceless fall, that him and his nose were okay but he continued to wobble along the ice with the gracefulness of a dying animal.

Loki, on the other hand was enjoying skating circles around everyone, making them dizzy, and trying to get Thor to chase him. He abandoned that idea though when Thor finally gave in, and fell backwards before he got an inch closer, screaming bloody murder on his journey back up again.

Everyone was so busy skating they didn't notice the Allfather escorted by two guards join them on the scene. If looks could kill…


End file.
